


bedlam of sleep

by glorious_spoon



Category: X-Men: First Class (2011) - Fandom
Genre: M/M, Nightmares, Past Abuse, Pining, Pre-Slash
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-07-09
Updated: 2012-07-09
Packaged: 2017-11-09 13:02:54
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,615
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/455755
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/glorious_spoon/pseuds/glorious_spoon
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Erik is used to nightmares, but this one is not his. Written for <a href="http://xmen-firstkink.livejournal.com/8700.html?thread=19338236#t19338236">this prompt</a> on <a href="http://xmen-firstkink.livejournal.com/profile"><img class="i-ljuser-userhead"/></a><a class="i-ljuser-username" href="http://xmen-firstkink.livejournal.com/"></a><b>xmen_firstkink</b>.</p>
            </blockquote>





	bedlam of sleep

**Author's Note:**

> _“The concept of dreaming is known to the waking mind but to the dreamer there is no waking, no real world, no sanity; there is only the screaming bedlam of sleep.”_  
>  -Stephen King; _Rose Madder_

He comes awake all at once in the darkness, nerves thrumming, breath tight in his chest. His hand curls, unconsciously, and he can feel the metal in the room around him, the keys on the nightstand and the tacky brass lamp, the door latch and the bed frames and the buckle of the belt that's tossed casually across Charles' open suitcase, all of it humming in response to his own tension. Weapons, just waiting to defend him.

Erik pushes his hands flat against the mattress, breathes in, out, in, out, a deliberate rhythm that’s slower and calmer than the pounding of his heart. Nightmares are old companions, and he knows how to deal with them.

He can feel his pulse slow, his trembling hands begin to still, but the fear does not go as it should. It is a relentless, clawing thing that makes the entire surface of his skin itch and crawl--

_(--slant dark mouthsmile whiskey breath, hands rough, bruised--)_

A sharp rattling breath that does not belong to Erik, feet kicking at the covers, and it's like falling through the thin ice of a winter lake, drowning in a terror that is not his own. Charles.

_(Charles come here my boy closer closer no need to look so frightened I wouldn't hurt you)_

Erik hears a moan, and he can't tell whether or not it came from his own mouth. The dark room fades in and out of his vision, hard lines softening and becoming indistinct, becoming shadows of themselves, a new room, and the fear presses in on him--

_(face pushed down into something soft, crinkled cotton and downy feathers, can't breathe he's breathing above me I can't breathe)_

\--darkwater fear and he can't breathe, he can't _breathe--_

Something sharp stabs his palm, the sudden pain of it jerking him back to himself. He looks down, and realizes that there is blood welling in the web of his thumb, black in the dim light of the room. The keys that were on the nightstand rattle against his skin, cheap brass but sharp enough along the edges to break the skin.

Clarity, sharp and sudden. His mind is his own, and in the other bed Charles is thrashing beneath the covers, moaning through clenched teeth like a wounded animal. This time, it seems, the nightmares were not of Erik's devising.

_"Verdammt,"_ he mutters. Just what they need now.

He can still feel Charles' fear battering at him, and he's swinging his feet over the side of his bed, crossing the rough space of carpet between them before he really considers what he's doing. Comfort is not his forte, and it feels like an excessive intimacy to sit down on the edge of the bed, to reach out for the damp skin of Charles' bare shoulder.

He means only to shake the man awake, but as soon as his fingers make contact there's a push, _(fear/panic/pain away go away DON'T TOUCH ME--)_

Erik is only vaguely aware of jerking back, of losing his precarious perch on the edge of the mattress and tumbling to the floor in a graceless sprawl of limbs. For a moment, he just lies there, stunned, and then there's a ragged gasp from above him.

"Charles," Erik says, pushing himself up. He feels dizzy, reeling, like he's been struck with something heavy. _"Charles!"_

Another gasp, and then Charles jerks upright, panting. For a terrible moment, his eyes stare wildly around the room, dark and panicked and unknowing, and then they fix, finally, on Erik.

"Oh, God." Charles sinks back against the headboard, rubs his hands over his face and then pushes them up into his hair, further disarranging the sweat-dark tangle of it. His breathing is unsteady but his voice, though chagrined, is remarkably calm. "Was I projecting? Erik, my friend, I am so sorry."

"It was a nightmare," Erik says, and it comes out as more of a question than he means it to.

Charles huffs out a laugh, quick and sharp and entirely without humor. "You could say that, yes."

Not just a nightmare, then.

"Are you--" he pauses, presses his lips together. This concern still feels alien to him, unsettling; it isn't something he knows how to deal with, entirely. Much like Charles himself. "Are you alright?"

Charles breathes out, shakily, then nods. "I will be, thank you. I'm sorry if I disturbed you."

_"Es ist in Ordnung, ich habe nicht geschlafen_ ," Erik murmurs, doesn't notice until the words leave his mouth that he's speaking German. He grimaces. It's a slip, and a rare one; careless, unlike him. He is more unsettled by this than he should be. "Sorry. I wasn't sleeping anyway."

Charles waves a hand, weary. "It's alright, I understood you. Although that was a lie."

Erik blinks at this, but the intrusion--if it was an intrusion--is a small one. In other circumstances, he still might snap something about keeping his mind to himself, but the twisted echo of Charles' nightmare (memory) is still lodged in Erik's brain. It's an ugly thing, all sickness and shadowed forms and fear, shame, hurt. And it's old: the dream-voice was painfully young, a thin, boyish ghost of Charles' smooth tenor.

_(don't please I'm sorry promise I won't tell don't touch me don't touch me don't touch me)_

The shifting edges leave no room for details, but Erik understands enough to fill most of them in.

He has, after all, seen nearly every type of ugliness that mankind is capable of conceiving. That this comes as any sort of a surprise at all is more a testament to sentiment than anything else, sentiment and Erik's idiot need to see Charles--brilliant, reckless, cheerfully dissolute Charles--as someone untouched by that ugliness.

"Who?" he asks, and Charles closes his eyes briefly, sighs. He could try to deny it, but he doesn't. He knows what Erik has seen; he knows (he must know) what he’s guessed.

"It doesn't matter, Erik. He's been dead a very long time now."

Erik opens his mouth, then clamps it shut again. Comfort is not something he knows how to give. He can offer his rage, but he already knows that Charles will not accept it. Finally, he asks, "Do you want to talk about it?"

"No," Charles says, and opens his eyes. He runs a hand over his face again, then smiles tiredly. "No, I'd really rather not. But thank you."

"Is there--" Erik begins, then stops. He wants to curse his mouth, the stupid awkwardness of it; he wants, mostly, for Charles to stop looking at him like that, curious and composed and not at all like Erik was just the unwilling witness to a private horror. Charles looks like he's waiting, like he's curious about what Erik might do next, when he knows, he _knows_ that Erik always must do the wrong thing here. Finally: "Is there--that is, can I--"

He breaks off for the second time and doesn't begin again. Charles' eyes are on him, so blue, and when he smiles this time it's genuine, unexpectedly sweet. "I wouldn't mind a game of chess," he says. "If you're feeling up to it."

Chess, Erik thinks. Chess is something he can provide. He’ll even let Charles win this time.

“Don’t you dare,” Charles says out loud, and then his smile twists ruefully when Erik looks up sharply at him. “Sorry. I’m still a bit--” his hand moves, a vague gesture that Erik could interpret so many ways, _broken, pulled apart at the seams and still trying to stitch myself back together,_ he knows that feeling himself, so well. “--oversensitive,” Charles finishes instead.

He rubs a hand over his face again, then slides out from under the covers. His bare feet are pale and somehow absurd to look at, his striped pajama bottoms a shade too long. The white undershirt he’s wearing pulls over surprisingly solid shoulders and chest; Charles is a sturdily built man under the baggy cardigans and prim suits, but he’s still short, and under the present circumstances it is too easy to read that as fragile. Breakable, and far too human.

This is precisely why Erik doesn’t let himself get close.

Charles crouches down to rummage through his messy suitcase and Erik’s eyes catch, as they always do in unguarded moments, on the quick grace of his hands and the slight, soft curl of the hair at the nape of his neck. It’s habitual, almost unconscious, at least until Charles looks up, handsomely carved travel chess set in hand, and lifts an eyebrow at him.

Erik looks away, but he can still track Charles’ movement out of the periphery of his vision as he stands moves back to the bed and settles onto it, tucking his legs up under him like a child. The quiet clatter of the board and the pieces and for several moments Charles seems entirely absorbed in arranging the set to his liking. When he finally speaks, his voice is soft, thoughtful.

“I don’t mind, you know.”

“What?”

A quiet breath of laughter, and Erik looks up to find Charles watching him. His hair is tangled, his eyes are red, and he badly needs a shave. He is, without question, the most beautiful thing Erik has ever seen. “If you want to look. Or if--” he stops, shakes his head. “I think I’m getting ahead of myself.”

“I don’t understand,” Erik says, and that much is certainly true.

“I’ll explain it to you later,” Charles says, and nudges the chess board toward him. He’s given Erik white, of course. Erik very deliberately does not read anything into that. “It’s your move.”  



End file.
